Mr. Kirankumar Nalla, Ph.D. research scholar (DST-INSPIRE) from the Department of Plant Sciences, School of Life Sciences, University of Hyderabad, working under supervision of Prof. Santosh R Kanade presented a paper titled “Inhibition of protein arginine methyltransferase 5 by natural compounds both in-vitro and in vivo” at a conference titled “Chromatin and Epigenetics”- organised by European Molecular Biology Laboratories (EMBL) held at EMBL Advanced Training Centre in Heidelberg, Germany from 15-05-2023 to 18-05-2023.
????????
This conference provided an international forum for cutting edge research in chromatin and epigenetics. It offered the “focal hub” for people to present their research and exchange ideas. Renowned speakers like Genevieve Almouzni (Institut Curie France), Asifa Akhtar (Max Planck Institute of Immunology and Epigenetics), Yehudit Bergman (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem), Robin Allshire, Wendy Bickmore (The University of Edinburgh-UK), Cornelis Murre (University of California, San Diego, USA) and Yang Shi (Ludwig cancer research-UK) and several renowned speakers and participants from across Germany, Europe, US Japan, Australia and India were covered the latest advances in the field.
EMBL groups and laboratories perform basic research in molecular biology and molecular medicine as well as train scientists, students, and visitors. EMBL pursues five missions which includes, Research, Services, Training, Technology transfer and Policy development. EMBL has more than 110 independent research groups and service teams covering the spectrum of molecular biology at six sites in Barcelona, Grenoble, Hamburg, Heidelberg, EMBL-EBI Hinxton and Rome. EMBL council comprises national representatives from member states and EMBL’s governing body, at present Professor Edith Heard FRS is acting as director general.
Kiran Kumar’s paper discusses the role of plant-derived bioactive compounds as novel modulators/inhibitors for protein arginine methyltransferase-5 (PRMT5), Protein arginine methyltransferases (PRMTs), especially PRMT5 of type II of PRMTs have been implicated in arginine methylation and cancer biology, recognized as an oncogene and the gene expressions have been noticed in diverse types of cancers and in inflammatory diseases. But the mechanistic explanation for the gene expression under cancer biology has been obscure. Against this backdrop, the author wants to understand the role of PRMT5 in cancer biology by in silico and in vitro analysis, and validate the functional modulation of PRMT5 by phytochemicals. Thus, the molecules may prove to have some therapeutic intervention as epigenetic modulators.
This paper is a part of his doctoral research project that explores the phytocompounds mediated PRMT5 regulation in breast cancer cell lines. The conference provided a platform for intense discussions on the latest research in the field of cancer biology and Epidrugs. And Mr. Kirankumar got potential contacts for future collaborations. Kiran Kumar’s travel for presenting the paper has been funded by the Institution of Eminence (IoE) travel grant scheme